Tuesday, February 4, 2014

United Ventures, the investment company specialized in digital technologies born from the union of Annapurna Ventures, of Massimiliano Magrini and JV Capital of Paolo Gesess, to "shake up digital entrepreneurship by spotting and promoting disruptive innovations"has raised €20M from the European Investment Fund(EIF), which is the most important institutional investor of european venture capital. With this second closing the overall raised funds of United Venturesamounts to €50M. The operation (which took place before Christmas but was announced only now), was made ​​under the Framework Programme for Competitiveness and Innovation of the European Commission CIP. EIF joins other investors in United Ventures, including the Italian Investment Fund, who committed €10M in the first closing while the remaining €20M have been committed by Fondazione Banco di Sardegna, the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Lucca, Banca Sella Holding and Banca Patrimoni Sella & C."The European Fund historically has invested very little in Italy and it is the first time that it does so in a corporate vehicle," said Massimiliano Magrini, co-founder of United Ventures, which has a portfolio with four companies (20lin.es, Halldis, LOVEThESIGN and MoneyFarm).United Ventures focuses its investments in innovative companies with global aspirations, supporting the national entrepreneurial capacity in the field of innovative digital technologies, which represent a huge opportunity for Italy and that VC as United Ventures can actually help bring out.The final closing of United Ventures is foreseen in April 2014, with a target of raising €60M.

on United Ventures: United Ventures is the new VC fund founded by Massimiliano Magrini and Paolo Gesess, founders of JV Capital and Annapurna Ventures respectively. Sponsor of the initiative was the Italian Fund of Investment which put €10 million at disposal of United Ventures in the first closing which reach €30 million of raised funds. The fund has a final target of €50 million.The team of United Ventures is formed by professional who have a deep knowledge of the digital space, such as Mario Mariani (partner of Annapurna Ventures and founder of The Net Value) and Sergio Zocchi (partner of Jupiter Ventures). Starting from the vehicle JV2 Capital, the team has promoted the broadening of the investor base allowing the birth of United Ventures, which set itself as reference operator in the italian context. The investor base sees the participation, beyond the Italian Investment Fund, of other institutional funds - such as Fondazione Banco di Sardegna, Foundation Savings Bank of Lucca, Banca Sella and Banca Patrimoni) and of private investors at the side of the management team, such as Matteo Fago, co-founder of Venere, Marco Corradino co-founder of Volagratis, Edoardo Loewenthal of 6Sicuro, Valerio De Molli of the European House Ambrosetti and Davide Serra of Algebris Investments.